


Our Best Friend's Wedding

by furiosity



Category: Free!
Genre: Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-10
Updated: 2014-12-10
Packaged: 2018-02-28 21:10:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2747207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/furiosity/pseuds/furiosity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mumblety years after high school, Nagisa and Makoto reconnect and learn some surprising things about each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Our Best Friend's Wedding

**Author's Note:**

  * For [longleggedgit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/longleggedgit/gifts).



> HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LINDSAY-SENSEI!!!! ILU I had entirely too much wine while writing some parts of this I'm very sorry in advance.
> 
> Mentions past unrequited Nagisa-->Rei and Makoto-->Haruka.

If Makoto sat through another speech by one of Rei's many aunties, he was going to have an accident all over his best suit, so he muttered a quick apology to Haru and the others and slunk out of the banquet hall, headed for the bathroom.

He loosened his tie as he walked out into the vestibule -- he wasn't used to wearing ties, and he'd made it a bit too tight. It had bothered him all afternoon, but he wasn't sure if it was socially acceptable to loosen one's tie during a wedding banquet. If it wasn't considered okay for women to adjust their wardrobe or touch up their make-up at public functions, then it seemed only fair that similar rules would apply to men.

Makoto didn't mind, either way: he had a great deal of patience for physical discomfort. Depending on whom you asked, that was a hazard -- or perk -- of working in early childhood education. A lot of the perks were double-edged, so to speak. For example, Makoto often found himself disappointed that he couldn't always apply his on-the-job coping skills to interactions with adults. He knew at least five who could benefit from being made to take a nap every once in a while.

After doing his business, he lingered by the enormous picture window on the opposite end of the vestibule. It overlooked snow-covered field so vast it was as though an entire sea had frozen there. Kaede had wanted a white wedding, so of course Rei had planned one -- at a remote Hokkaido estate at Christmas. Being an award-winning, nationally renowned designer could open a surprising number of doors, Makoto had learned. Two privately chartered double-decker buses had awaited the guests at Sapporo Station yesterday.

He still thought the sparkling white Cinderella carriage with the white horses in faux-fur trimmed white booties over their feet had been a bit much. It _had_ looked magical, gliding up to the reception hall building -- silently, thanks to both the snow-covered road and the booties. There hadn't been a dry eye in the crowd by the time Rei -- dressed in white, of course -- helped his bride out of the carriage, both of them elegant as you please and as pretty as a postcard.

Until just now, Makoto had been so swept up in the grandiosity of it all that he'd forgotten that he'd meant to check in at work. His boss had practically bullied him into taking a whole week off for this wedding event, though it ran for five days -- two for travelling and three for the festivities. Makoto had only asked for three to begin with, figuring he could make his own travel arrangements somehow, but then it turned out that Rei had personally contacted the school director and asked him to let Makoto go for five days as a personal favour. After that, the boss had given Makoto seven days. He hadn't had a whole week off since university.

He decided there would be no harm in checking his phone quickly. What if there had been a fire at school? Not that he could do anything about it from here, but he could at least check in on the director. He didn't even need to go upstairs -- the guestrooms were too small to have separate closets, so everyone's outerwear had to remain in a vestibule cloakroom. And Makoto's phone was in his coat pocket.

The cloakroom was little more than a long, narrow passageway lined on both sides with sturdy coat racks at the top and benches with roomy shoe alcoves underneath them. Nagisa sat burrowed into the space between a long leather trench coat and a lady's shearling coat dyed an outrageously bright purple. Makoto once again marvelled at how someone so tiny -- Nagisa never did get taller since high school -- could actually be one of the most relentless public prosecutors his district had seen in decades. Nagisa had been appointed three years ago -- right around the time Rei and Kaede got engaged -- and since then he had rarely made it to any of their already infrequent get-togethers.

Nagisa always joked that the higher-up string-pullers picked him for the job because he'd looked adorably easy to manipulate. Well, they'd been in for a surprise. Nagisa had aimed at the prosecutor's office ever since a scandalous information leak that had happened while he'd still been at law school revealed that not nearly enough was being done to protect the rights of crime victims. He had pursued a prosecutor's office appointment with the same dogged determination he'd always applied to everything, from swimming to running away from home. And then he had all but disappeared into the work until Rei's wedding day.

"Nagisa?" Makoto ventured. "We've been wondering where you got off to--"

Nagisa looked up with eyes so red and puffy there could be no mistake: he'd been crying. It hadn't been the _I-always-cry-at-weddings_ type of crying; that much was obvious.

"What's wrong?" Makoto asked. By instinct, he knelt in front of Nagisa -- it was what he would always do with the kids at work: make himself smaller.

Nagisa met his eyes, sighed, and looked away.

"It's because it's Rei, isn't it?" Makoto ventured. He dealt with crying kids every day; a lot of the time they calmed down with just a reassuring person to cry into. He wasn't sure if that would work between grown-ups, though, and there was nothing childlike about Nagisa. So he felt pretty silly, but to move now would be too conspicuous and embarrassing.

Nagisa sighed again, long and loud. "Not really," he said. "Not Rei the person… it's more the _idea_ of Rei. Or what he... meant, I guess. He was… I got over it. Eventually. Now it's more like nostalgia, a bit like-- like wishing I could go back and do it all over. I forgot how sad it feels to wish for things that can't happen. That makes no sense, does it?"

"He was your first love," Makoto said. It should have been a question, but Makoto couldn't pretend like he didn't know what Nagisa meant. He had always wondered about Nagisa and Rei, but it hadn't fully connected until he saw Nagisa's tear-streaked face just now.

"It's not the kind of thing most people can relate to," Nagisa said, his tone suddenly airy. He was trying to change the subject.

"You'd be surprised how much _I_ can relate," Makoto heard himself say. He immediately wished he could take it back -- this was hardly the time or the place to come out. Especially considering they were almost literally in a closet. But Nagisa deserved to know that he wasn't alone, that he had never been alone. Maybe that would help him make peace with the past once again. "I was in love with Haru from before I even knew what it meant."

Nagisa's mouth, no doubt opened to tell Makoto they didn't need to talk about this any more, snapped shut. He searched Makoto's face with eyes so earnest they recalled the old Nagisa: all charm and just a little bit of guile.

"Are you still?" Nagisa asked in a small voice.

Makoto smiled and shook his head. "Not for a long time now."

"Haru never knew, either?"

Makoto bit his lip. "I -- uh, I, well, I told him. Back when we were living in Tokyo. He wasn't interested."

"So next it's my turn to find you crying at his wedding, huh?" Nagisa asked, rubbing the last of the tears from his face.

"No, I mean, he's not interested in sex, romance, anything like that."

"Oh." Nagisa scratched his temple. "No happy ending either way, huh."

"I wouldn't say that," Makoto said. "Once I knew it was never going to happen, I was able to let it go. Eventually, just like you said. That's happy enough for me. And I think Haru's happy as he is."

"But if Haru had been a different person and got married eventually, do you think it would have made you sad even though you didn't... love him any more?"

"Probably," Makoto said. "I've never thought about it."

"Now you have."

They both laughed. It was silly, them having known each other for so very long and ending up having this deeply personal conversation in a musty old room smelling of snow-wet corduroy and aged leather. Nagisa caught Makoto's eye, and they both kind of froze as the space between them suddenly became too close for friendly conversation. Makoto willed himself to pull back, increase the distance and break the too-thick silence, but Nagisa was leaning forward with a determined look in his eyes, like a man with something to prove. 

His mouth tasted like too much wine and his skin smelled like the lavender soap in the men's upstairs showers.

The kiss lasted barely twenty seconds before Makoto turned aside, embarrassed and nervous and a million other feelings he'd forgotten the names for. He got to his feet and shoved some coats out of the way so he could sit on the bench.

"How about you and me?" Nagisa asked in a voice full of newfound wonder. 

_Well, he's still not the type to waste any time, obviously._

"I don't think right now is a good time to be making such a decision," Makoto said, though his heart hadn't pounded like this in a lot of years. It had felt incredibly nice to kiss Nagisa. He just wasn't sure if it was because he wanted to kiss _Nagisa_ or because he'd wanted to kiss _somebody_ for such a long time.

He wasn't the cruising type, and even if he were, the effort involved was tremendous: he had to go to a different city, use a false name, and wear a disguise. As a teacher at a very expensive private kindergarten, he couldn't afford even the merest hint of indecency or impropriety tied to him. Not to mention that if anyone even suspected he was gay, he'd be asked to resign lest a parent get wind of it and accuse the school of deliberately hiring perverts.

The way Nagisa kept staring at his mouth made Makoto feel like a pervert, that was for sure.

"That was nice though," Nagisa murmured, scooting closer. "Don't you want to find out how much nicer it could get? I want to."

Makoto entertained the idea of going to Kobe, where Nagisa worked. It was far enough from home that he could feel safe -- and then it hit him that Nagisa, too, had a reputation to uphold. A much more public one than Makoto's, and just as much to lose. Nagisa was the one type of person Makoto had never had -- someone he could trust completely. Did Nagisa feel the same about him? Was it really a good idea to go… further? What about their friendship? What about all their other friends?

"I-- I'm not good at this stuff," Makoto stammered. "I'm n-not into casual... things."

"I know," Nagisa said. "I was thinking about something a little more complicated."

"I'm literally twice your size," Makoto muttered, pretending Nagisa hadn't just said that. "I'd probably break you in half if we, you know. Let's not."

"If that's what you're worried about, I'll top," Nagisa scoffed. Then he put his hand casually on Makoto's thigh. The upper part.

Makoto blushed and didn't move Nagisa's hand. "Neither of us is topping in this coatroom, Nagisa."

"Where's your sense of adventure?"

"What sense of adventure? I'm a kindergarten teacher." 

Makoto got up and took a deep breath, wondering why he was becoming so flustered. This was _Nagisa_. They'd known each other since they were little!

And the basic, most fundamental thing everyone knew about Nagisa was that once he made up his mind to do something, few forces in this world could stop him. Makoto wasn't sure he wanted Nagisa to stop. He also wasn't sure if this excited or terrified him. Or both.

"This is probably a terrible idea," Makoto whispered as Nagisa rose from the bench and stepped closer. He _did_ want to kiss Nagisa. Specifically. He hadn't just missed kissing in general.

Nagisa took Makoto's hand and tugged him towards the door, like he used to when they'd been kids. "We'll never know if we don't try."

They came back to the table together, and Nagisa returned to regaling Gou and her plus one with tales from the courtroom trenches as though he hadn't been absent for the better part of an hour. Makoto did his best to pay careful attention to the continuing speeches and exclaim over every new dish that got brought around to their table. Alcohol was abundant, but he stuck to wine and paced himself the way he always did at staff parties. Makoto rather liked the feeling of intoxication, but people with awkward secrets couldn't afford to drink enough to forget where they were.

Rei and Kaede cut the cake, and then it was time to dance. Makoto dutifully asked the bride for a dance, and Gou, since she was at their table, and then Rei's mom and a gaggle of aunts all wanted a turn. They wanted to know if Makoto was thinking about marriage, and if not, why doesn't he meet so-and-so and see if they can't make a good match. Makoto smiled and made the expected noises, but his mind kept returning to Nagisa's eyes and he kept searching the dance floor for a glimpse of Nagisa's hair. He shouldn't wonder if it was as soft as it looked, but he did anyway. His heart was stirring in ways he'd forgotten it could, and Makoto withdrew to the living quarters as soon as the emcee declared the party over for the evening.  
 _What should I do?_

Makoto lay on the bed in his room in the mansion's east wing and wondered if he should have tried to talk to Nagisa before running away. Though that would have defeated the purpose of running away. It shouldn't be affecting him so much. They had each confessed a long-held secret to each other today. Of course it made sense that he suddenly felt closer to Nagisa than ever. That didn't mean they had to make out. Just because they were both gay didn't mean they had to date. They didn't even live in the same prefecture. It had been a moment's weakness on both their parts, and now it had passed.

_So why can't I stop thinking about it?_

Someone knocked on his door.

"Nice pyjamas," Nagisa said by way of greeting. He stood in the hallway with a mostly full bottle of white wine, a pair of plastic cups on the bottle's neck.

Makoto flushed and smoothed down the thick flannel pyjama jacket covered in cartoon penguins. He'd gotten the set as a gag gift from Rin a few years back. "I forgot they have central heating in Hokkaido."

"May I come in?"

Makoto stood aside to let him in. "Of course. How did you even know where to find me?"

"Oh, I called Rei-chan and he checked the floor assignments for me."

Makoto gasped. "Nagisa, it's his _wedding night_!"

Nagisa waved a dismissive hand. "He picked up the phone when I called, didn't he? Can't have been all that busy. Maybe Kaede-chan was still in the bath."

"Still!"

"Oh, give me a break," Nagisa complained. "It's not like I went to their suite and demanded to ask Rei in person. Why does everyone think I'm some kind of a cockblock?"

"Erm," Makoto offered. They had been friends for a frightening number of years, and he knew it was futile to try and convince Nagisa that he had terrible timing.

Nagisa took a seat in one of the armchairs facing the window and poured wine into the two glasses. "Let's have a drink."

Makoto joined him, though he was a bit concerned about the way Nagisa wouldn't meet his eyes. They talked for a while about the party, and plans for tomorrow's events, and when they ran out of things to say, Makoto was well on the way to tipsy again, so he refused the next round. 

"We should probably try to sleep soon," he said, glancing at the old-timey clock above the fake fireplace on the wall opposite the bed. Outside it was pitch-dark but for a pair of lamps at the separate wing entrance directly beneath Makoto's room. They cast soft semicircles of light on the snow-covered walkway.

"Before I go, let me apologise," Nagisa said, his face serious. "About what I did to you."

Makoto should have felt relieved, but instead his heart panged with unexpected loss. He had enjoyed the kiss, for his part. Nagisa didn't have to make it sound like something Makoto had endured against his will. "You don't have anything to apologise for, Nagisa."

"No, I do. I-- I got caught up in the moment and did something selfish. I was just suddenly curious what it would feel like to kiss you, so I did it. I didn't think about your feelings. The stuff I said after, I guess I was just trying to save face. So I wouldn't have to admit to doing something impulsive. I don't think we should do anything like that again."

Makoto's insides went cold, and he quickly put on a smile. "Ah, is that so."

"I'm sorry," Nagisa said quickly.

"It's okay," Makoto said. "I understand." 

He _didn't_ understand. Nagisa had never been the world's most considerate person, but he'd never been the type to just take whatever he wanted without even thinking about another person's feelings. It hurt. It hurt that the half confused, half elated feelings he'd carried in his chest all evening had been all for nothing.

But he'd get over it. He always did. _Is this what Nagisa meant by something a little more complicated?_ "It's really better that way," he continued. "I'm relieved you feel the same way, really. It would've been much too strange."

"No hard feelings?" Nagisa asked, his eyes hopeful.

"It's a promise." 

Makoto had never understood the purpose of holding grudges or harbouring ill feelings towards people. It only ever ended badly for everyone, including the grudge-bearer. It was easier to work things through on his own and forgive, even if no one said sorry. And Nagisa _had_ done that. He'd come here to make a personal apology, even. He'd find a place to put all these uninvited feelings. Maybe he could try forcing himself to watch scary movies again.

Nagisa left the half-empty wine bottle behind, and Makoto had a mind to lock his door and drink the rest. Maybe it would be enough to make him forget. He'd come to this wedding to celebrate Rei's happiness, not to mope about how lonely he was.

He was just about to pour when another knock came at his door.

"I lied," Nagisa half-whispered, pushing past Makoto, shutting the door behind him with both hands. He leaned back against it and looked up into Makoto's face. "I do want to kiss you. A lot. I thought you didn't want any complications, I thought you'd be relieved. But you just looked sad."

"I--"

"Don't tell me you aren't sad. I do this for a living, you know."

"What, confuse me half to death?"

"I have to be able to tell what people are feeling even when they're trying to hide it." Nagisa touched Makoto's face. "Don't be sad."

Makoto swallowed past the lump in his throat and folded his fingers over Nagisa's, lowering his hand. "Did you really mean it when you said you do want to kiss me? Or are you just saying that now because you don't want me to be sad?"

"I want to kiss you. And I don't want you to be sad." Nagisa shook Makoto's hand off and touched his cheek again. "Or me. I don't want me to be sad."

"Nagisa--"

"I'll be sad if you don't kiss me right now."

"Nagisa--!"

"I'll go back to my room and cry," Nagisa interrupted again.

The sense of exasperation at Nagisa's inexhaustible supply of ridiculous ideas was familiar, nostalgic. The urgent need to make it so there was as little distance between their bodies as possible was completely new, but far from unwelcome.

"Keep your voice down," Makoto murmured, leaning closer. 

"I know of a really good way to shut me up," Nagisa whispered. "It's called kissing me, you should try it. It really works."

"I feel like you're trying to tell me something," Makoto said into Nagisa's ear.

"Mako-chan," Nagisa whined. 

Makoto kissed him. Of course he did.

_five years later_

"What are you looking at?" Nagisa asked, putting his chin on Makoto's shoulder. He did that whenever Makoto sat down long enough for him to try: he said it made him feel super tall.

"Just tagging pictures on my phone. I've been meaning to do it forever." Makoto swiped to the next photo, and it was of him and Nagisa in front of the Iwatobi-chan snow statue Haru had made on Day Two of Rei's wedding extravaganza.

"That was the _only_ photo I took that whole trip," Makoto said. "Thanks to _somebody_ knocking my phone off a hill."

"Thank goodness for the Cloud," Nagisa said in an extremely pious sort of voice.

Makoto flicked his nose. "I'll show you a cloud."

"I'd rather look at your nipples. Show me those." Nagisa circled around the armchair and climbed into Makoto's lap.

Makoto kissed his forehead. "You forgot to say please."

"I didn't forget. That was an order."

"Uh-huh," Makoto murmured, letting Nagisa's hair tickle his nose. He lifted the phone again and looked at their smiling faces. No one else knew that had been their first date.

_Hazuki Nagisa,_ he tagged it. He thought about adding _love_ but what if someone used his phone and saw that? Besides, Nagisa would just make faces over how old-fashioned and cheesy it was. So Makoto added a different tag instead: one that could mean anything to someone else, but meant only one thing to him.

_Always._

[end]


End file.
